JAKARTA: Indonesian authorities ordered people living near a volcano to leave their homes on Friday and a major city closed its airport after the 5,500 meter (18,000 ft) peak sent a column of steam and ash into the sky. The Mount Merapi volcano on densely populated Java island is one of the most active in Indonesia and a series of eruptions in 2010 killed more than 350 people. A disaster mitigation agency told residents living within a 5 km (3 mile) radius of the mountain to move to shelters, agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said in a statement. The airport in Yogyakarta, the nearest big city to the volcano, shut because of the threat from the ash, the state-owned aviation agency AirNav said in a statement. The disaster agency described Merapi’s latest eruption as phreatic, which means magma heats up groundwater and vapour is released under pressure.

Source: Pakistan Today May 11, 2018 04:41 UTC